When I set out to write this post, I remembered having seen countless paintings of the cliffs at Etretat in France (Wikipedia image). It’s true, I have seen tons, but I didn’t recall exactly how many of them were by Claude Monet.
Monet rarely painted a scene only once. He painted many series, some of which you’ve seen on this blog (water lilies, Rouen Cathedral). Monet loved experimenting with light. He would paint the same subject at dawn, noon, dusk, night, and every time in between, using color changes to show the different lighting conditions. The cliffs at Etretat were no exception. Below is the Manneporte, Etretat, painted at different times by Monet.
Monet rarely painted a scene only once. He painted many series, some of which you’ve seen on this blog (water lilies, Rouen Cathedral). Monet loved experimenting with light. He would paint the same subject at dawn, noon, dusk, night, and every time in between, using color changes to show the different lighting conditions. The cliffs at Etretat were no exception. Below is the Manneporte, Etretat, painted at different times by Monet.
And below is Monet’s The Cliff, Etretat, Sunset. I chose to show you this painting because I remember seeing it when it was included in the Monet in Normandy exhibition at the Cleveland Museum of Art last year and the image stuck with me. I love the sun in this painting.
It wasn’t just Monet who painted this scene, though. Below, find Gustave Courbet’s take on the cliffs in The Cliffs at Etretat and Etretat After a Storm. 
Eugene Boudin’s Etretat, The Cliff of Aval (below).
Eugene Delacroix also painted the cliffs but I couldn’t find a picture online to show you. You can always go to the library and look it up in a book if you’re interested.If you can think of any other artists who painted this scene, please leave a comment and I’ll try to add images. I'm sure I've forgotten some.
And since, in the writing of this post, I realized that I haven’t yet written about Monet’s life and work, look forward to that at some point this week.
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I am participating in NaNoEdMo, though I haven't signed up (and I'm not sure if I will). Also, I forgot about it until today (only one day late) so I'm slightly behind. I'll be caught up by tomorrow. The goal of NaNoEdMo is to dedicate 50 hours to editing a novel during the moth of March. This goal is not nearly as insane as that of NaNoWriMo so I'm confident I'll be successful. I just need a little something to spur me onward. This project will be finished by my birthday!
(Or at least much closer to finished...)
Current NaNoEdMo Hour Count: 2.25/50 hours
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